The End of Forever
by Tears of Stardust
Summary: Revised and reposted! Gaea: a planet that existed only as a memory in a young girl's heart...until now. With the discovery of Gaea by Earth, Hitomi must travel back to help Gaea become myth once more, and to stop a woman with no past from seducing Van a


Chapter 1  
  
Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. I do not own Escaflowne, nor am I making any profit out of creating stories about it. This disclaimer applies for this and following chapters whether it is read or not. Bob's your uncle.  
  
Big Long Author's Note: After letting this story stagnate on the net for a long time, I've decided to take it down and totally redo the entire thing as my narrative style has made leaps and bounds since I first typed up the original on an old laptop. I'd also like to thank the following reviewers who read through the original version and still liked it, even though it was little more than chicken scratch: dancegoddess, Pixie^A^, Panchan1, Sarsa, Artamis Godess of the Hunt, the original esca chick, Koduku Kaze Shiroi, kana, Yokan, Isy Okolo, ScarletFyre, cringe, Tevrah, AkaneKitten, who cares4. You all rule and are a huge part of the reason I've decided to redo this. Happy reading.  
  
Wilt thou change this world Or wilt thou change thyself? Wilt thou live on with thy mother planet Or wilt thou turn thy back on the Planet and tread another path? - Chrono Cross  
  
A shrill and constant ring pierced her concentration, making her furrow her eyebrows in an attempt to regain her train of thought. Of all the time in the world, the phone had to ring when she didn't need it the most. Hitomi sighed as she reluctantly placed the deck of worn and dirty tarot cards back down on her desk, stirring up the little dust bunnies that had accumulated there. It was impossible for Hitomi to think of anything other than Gaea, much less something as tedious and pointless as housecleaning.  
  
She leaned toward the back of the chair, bracing her spine against its hard wooden surface while running her hand through the top of her hair. Hitomi had been trying to do a reading that might tell her something - anything- about Van, but before she had even drawn one card her fragile concentration had been shattered by one telephone ring.  
  
"Hitomi! Yukari's on the phone! She says it's urgent!" her mother's voice yelled throughout the house in an attempt to get her daughter's attention. Hitomi merely rolled her eyes before she attempted to rise from her chair. With Yukari, everything was urgent.  
  
She slowly walked downstairs to see her mother impatiently awaiting her, tapping the beige phone softly against the side of her leg. Her eyebrows were knit together with impatience, and she sighed deeply when her daughter made her way down the stairs. "Hitomi, when someone says that something's urgent, people usually respond as quickly as they can," Hitomi's mother gently chided.  
  
Hitomi rolled her eyes again as her mother handed her the phone. Sometimes parents just didn't get it. "Hello?" she asked into the phone, mentally bracing herself against the bubbly onslaught about Amano that Yukari was about spill.  
  
"Hitomi!" Yukari's excited voice echoed through the phone wires, "You would not believe what has happened today!"  
  
"Uh huh," was all that Hitomi cared to utter, as she knew from experience that to ask about Amano was an invitation to more mindless chatter. It wasn't that Hitomi didn't enjoy talking to Yukari, it was just the girl had a one-track mind as of late, and the only way it headed was Amano, Amano, Amano.  
  
"Amano asked me to go steady with him! Isn't that so romantic?" Yukari began as Hitomi decided to sit in one of the nearby chairs that surrounded her circular kitchen table. This was going to be one long conversation.  
  
"He was going to . . ." Yukari just kept talking on and on about Amano, but Hitomi decided to tune her out. All of Yukari's happiness reminded her of Van and they relationship they had share. . .still share.  
  
Hitomi gaze drifted around the room as Yukari's happy chatter filled her ear, looking first at the circular oak table in the middle of the room, then slowly moving toward her counter whereupon a little colour tv sat. Hitomi couldn't hear it over Yukari's voice, but instead contented herself with looking at the multi-coloured flashes of pictures that consisted of the evening news.  
  
Suddenly, a picture familiar to her from looking up at the night sky of Gaea came on screen, causing Hitomi's mouth to drop open and her to lose her grip on the phone, letting it crash on the hard linoleum below. "Hitomi? Hitomi?" Yukari's worried voice called through the phone, but Hitomi stepped over the receiver and closer to the tv, turning the volume knob as she did so.  
  
" . . . And this is what a computerized image of the view from the newfound planet is speculated to look like. This breaking news came early this morning when a group of scientists released a statement to the Japanese government about the whereabouts of another planet with life inside this solar system!" The news announcer kept going on about a bombing in a third world country, but Hitomi just stood there, feeling all the blood drain from her face and paint her a deathly pale colour. Hitomi heard the phone line go dead as Yukari hung up, and then the operator came on with instructions on how to place another call.  
  
Hitomi must have stood there for about three minutes until her mother came in again, not noticing her colour or the way she seemed frozen in place. "What did Yukari want dear? Another tarot reading for her and Amano?"  
  
Hitomi looked at her mother, and then an idea struck her like a bolt of lightning. She raced upstairs to her room and over to the desk where she had placed her deck of tarot cards. Hitomi hesitantly pulled up the first card, and gasped at what she saw.  
  
Hitomi's hand trembled as she beheld the card that appeared before her eyes. 'No, it must be a mistake,' she thought, but there it was, seeming to grin at her as though it knew it would almost shatter the fragile existence of the girl who held it.  
  
The tower card.  
  
She suddenly recoiled, like the card was a contagious disease that she would catch by holding on to it for too long. It slowly fluttered to the ground, landing face up. On the picture of the card, the people that fell from its high ascent seemed to curse her for their misery. Hitomi began to walk backwards, her hands on the sides of her face while all she could utter was a whispery "no".  
  
She bumped up against her wall and screamed, which caused her mother to run up the stairs, her face the same shade of white as her daughter's had been only moments before. "Hitomi!" she called, running into her room and looking around to see what had caused her to scream.  
  
She looked over and saw Hitomi against the wall of her beige coloured room, a single tear streaking out of her right eye. "Hitomi, what's wrong?" her mother asked, slowly walking toward her daughter, trying not to frighten her the same way you wouldn't try to frighten a caged animal.  
  
Hitomi's eyes darted all around the room before they fell on her mother. She seemed to have a hard time breathing, one breath struggling to get out while the next fought it's way in. She was trembling faster and faster, the realization of what was happening hitting her with greater force everything she thought about it.  
  
She then looked at her mother, and a sort of crooked smile appeared upon her face. "Mother, I'm leaving again. This time I may not come back."  
  
Hitomi's mother took a step back in shock at her daughter's words, and was going to argue when Hitomi pushed past her and ran out the door of her room. She pounded down the stairs, and when she neared the door she grabbed her gym bag, which she had forgotten to unpack from school that morning and headed out the door.  
  
Her mother's cries were far behind her as she ran across the busy street, narrowly missing an approaching bus carrying a pack of tourists. She ran on to the adjoining sidewalk, pushing people out of the way as she ran. 'Van, I'm coming,' Hitomi thought, elation filling her as she made her through the crowded sidewalks.  
  
She turned and ran through a nearby park, one set upon a natural gorge. Hitomi leapt over a nearby wooden bench, and stopped near the chain link fence that prevented visitors from getting too close to the lip of the gorge, only slightly out of breath form all of her training.  
  
"Van, I'm coming! I want to go to Gaea! Take me back to Gaea, Van!" Hitomi raised her head to the sky, and lifted her arms, as though beckoning the sky to reach down and wrap her in a tender hug. Passerby either hurried past rather quickly, or stopped to gawk at the rowdy teenager.  
  
Hitomi's breathing started to slow, and she began to slowly lower her arms. Why wasn't Van helping her? Didn't he want her to come back? Hitomi began to chew upon her bottom lip, just as two officers from park security neared her, being very cautious about how they approached her. One of them was short, heavy and looked rather tired and old, while the other was a wiry young recruit, both of them watching Hitomi with hawk eyes.  
  
"Miss? Are you alright miss?" the young one questioned softly, not wanting to upset her seemingly fragile state of mind.  
  
Hitomi looked back at them in puzzlement. She wasn't crazy, why were they approaching her so? Hitomi guessed that they just didn't understand what she was trying to do.  
  
"Man, this chick's a nut," Hitomi heard the heavy guard whisper to the other, "I can't wait til we haul her in and get her off the streets."  
  
Hitomi's froze for about three seconds, her mind processing what she had just heard. She couldn't let them catch her, not while Gaea was in trouble, not while Van was in trouble. She looked around quickly, looking for an exit.  
  
Her eyes fell upon the chain link fence, something she knew the guards wouldn't cross to get to her. She grabbed on to the fence and started to climb as fast as she could. The guards raced forward, and the younger of the two grabbed her foot. She began to kick until she finally hit his wrist, causing him to bellow in pain and release her.  
  
She began to cross the top of the fence, where jagged wires poked up at her. The other guard shook the fence in an attempt to make her lose her balance and fall on his side of the fence. It only half worked, as Hitomi did lose her balance for a second, but it caused her to fall on the other side of the fence, and she scraped her arm across the wires.  
  
Blood began to run down her left arm, but Hitomi ignored it and dropped from the fence. She placed her duffel bag on the ground on the other side of the fence, and grabbed a cloth bandage. She wound it around her arm, ignoring the yelling from the guards and other passerby on the other side of the fence.  
  
Hitomi then slung the bag over her shoulder and winked at the guards. She strode out toward the edge of the gorge, somewhere she could have some privacy. Hitomi went carefully, making her way through various twisted tree roots and debris from visitors that the wind swept over the fence.  
  
She found a good spot on a tree root, and called out to Van again. "Van, please, I need to go back. You have to be warned. Please." The only answer was the wind blowing through the gorge below, and Hitomi began to feel bitter disappointment course through her.  
  
Suddenly, her vision became clouded, and she felt as though she were floating on air. 'Oh no, not another vision, not here.' She turned and saw the legendary guymelef, Escaflowne, battling against a legion of other melefs, only these ones were a deep green. They circled totally around Escaflowne, cutting off all chances of escape. Although it's sword sliced through many a guymelef, killing the pilots, another always came and took the place of a fallen one.  
  
Suddenly, a melef that Van had failed to notice behind him pulled out a sword and plunged it deeply into the back of Escaflowne. Hitomi covered her mouth with her hands, and then she heard the most horrifying thing in her life. Van, screaming out in pain beyond pain, for he would surely die. Hitomi herself screamed, and then was immediately thrust back into the present world.  
  
During her vision, she had slowly backed out onto a far-reaching tree root that hung over the gorge. She felt it sway under her weight, and a wave of fear washed over her. She started to walk toward the gorge edge again, but a gust of wind caught the root, sending Hitomi falling to the rock floor below.  
  
She screamed, and then braced herself for the impact to come . . . 


End file.
